New Memphis-Shelby County Schools Superintendent Dr. Marie Feagins has looked to a variety of voices for assistance as she charts a path for the state’s largest school district.On Tuesday she heard from the youngest advisors.The 103-student transition team known as the “Legacy Builders” met at the Memphis Botanic Garden to present feedback for how the district can increase support, engagement, and academics.

If it wasn’t for Ruby Bridges, Ben Williams’ circle of friends would be smaller — and whiter. That’s why, when the 11-year-old Grahamwood Elementary School student read about how Bridges endured death threats and racial slurs to attend all-white William Frantz Elementary School in New Orleans in 1960, he wrote a letter thanking her.

The Memphis Grizzlies National Basketball Association (NBA) team is providing a donation to provide students at Fox Meadows Elementary and John P. Freeman Optional School with an all-new basketball hoop system.

Soulsville Charter School senior Elisha Muhammad says a high school internship set her on a new path to advocate for those trying to overcome systemic barriers.

Ben Frazier says traditional public schools have failed his autistic son.Frazier told members of the Memphis Shelby County School Board last week that his family has faced a lack of communication and accommodation at district-run schools, but everything changed when he enrolled his son at Wooddale Middle School.“When I got my child to Wooddale, everything changed. Wooddale is a family-oriented school. They take care of the kids,” said Frazier. “It’s a neighborhood school, they deal with the community. The staff keeps the parents informed, everything that I was not getting when he was not at Green Dot Schools, I’m getting now. My son is excelling, he came out of his shell, you can’t even tell that my son is on the spectrum because they have worked with him so much and I appreciate Wooddale so much for everything that they have done.

Memphis-Shelby County Schools is asking the county for more than $200 million in funding for school buildings, both to address maintenance needs at existing schools and to support construction of two new high schools.The request exceeds even the expanded school buildings budget supported by a county wheel tax increase last year, and it’s not clear how much of it the county can provide. Projected costs for the two new high schools have risen by tens of millions of dollars since county commissioners approved initial funding for them.

Brittany Jones told members of the Memphis-Shelby County School Board her 13-year-old son has seen real change at the Memphis Grizzlies Preparatory Charter School.She says her son is autistic and she enrolled him there two years ago hoping the all-boys public charter school would be a good fit. Jones says the change has been so positive she’s supporting the school’s plan to offer a similar school for girls.

The Memphis-Shelby County School Board unanimously approved an agreement Tuesday night to spend $28 million increasing teacher salaries.The historic investment will raise the average teacher with a bachelor’s degree’s salary by more than $4,800 in the 20224/2025 school year. Teachers with a master’s degree will average nearly $4,800 more, education specialists will see more than $6,300 more, and those with a doctorate will average more than a $9,900 increase.

Empower Memphis Career and College Prep will begin serving Orange Mound and South Memphis students a year later than planned.Chief Executive Officer Muna Olaniyi announced to supporters this week that the public charter school’s opening has been postponed until August 2025 because of facility-related challenges.

New Memphis-Shelby County Schools (MSCS) Superintendent Dr. Marie Feagins is planning to listen to a diverse set of voices as she charts the path forward for the state’s largest school district.Last week Feagins announced the transition team that will help craft and execute the district’s next strategic plan and over the weekend she joined the co-chairs of that team at a retreat involving education leaders from across the country.

Three proposed new public charter schools in Memphis may have a challenging road finding approval from school board members next week.Tuesday night the Memphis-Shelby County Schools’ (MSCS) charter review team recommended a denial for all three including Blueprint College and Career Prep, Journey Northeast Academy, and the Memphis Grizzlies Prep STEAM School for Girls.Board members are scheduled to vote on each application at its meeting next Tuesday.

For more than a decade the Memphis Grizzlies Preparatory Charter School has provided middle-school aged boys with a science, technology, engineering, arts, and mathematics (STEAM) focused education in Memphis and last year school leaders proposed creating a similar school for girls.The Memphis-Shelby County School Board denied that application in 2023 but the proposal is back with some changes to address the concerns board members had.

As the job market in the greater Memphis area continues to expand, more schools that focus on career and technical education (CTE) and college prep will be in demand. This is especially true for low-income neighborhoods where students face barriers entering the workforce.It’s one reason why the founders of Blueprint College and Career Prep (BCCP) chose the Southeast Memphis communities of Oakhaven and Parkway Village as the location for their proposed public charter school. They say families there want a high-quality public education option that addresses each community’s needs.

Humes Middle School in North Memphis will close at the end of this school year as it returns to the Memphis Shelby-County district’s control after a decade in Tennessee’s failed turnaround district for low-performing schools.The last-minute decision to shutter the nearly 100-year-old building, where a young Elvis Presley attended high school, is a change in plans since the fall, when teachers were told the school would stay open, said Bobby White, head of Frayser Community Schools, the charter company that runs Humes for the state’s Achievement School District.

New Memphis schools leader Marie Feagins plans to rely on a group of former and current superintendents for support during her transition to the role by working with the Council of the Great City Schools, a national coalition of big-city districts.The council’s work in Memphis could serve as a pilot project for future educators new to the superintendency.

At 12:39 p.m., as the moon took its first bite of the sun, a group of Craigmont High School students looked up at the dome of the school’s planetarium to watch a video showing them exactly what would happen over the course of the day’s solar eclipse.This time, it wasn’t the “missed opportunity” school staff sensed during the last solar eclipse in 2017, when Craigmont’s planetarium was still in disrepair.Following a successful fundraising campaign several years ago, the Raleigh community jewel has become operational again, allowing students to visualize the perfect alignment of the sun, Earth, and moon that makes a solar eclipse happen.

When Lawrence Blackwell moved his family to Tennessee in 2010 to work for the University of Memphis, he chose to send his son to a unique Pre-K program operated by his new employer.The experience was so positive Blackwell kept his son on the university campus and enrolled him in its elementary school.

By every measurement, the three public schools the University of Memphis operates on its campus are producing academic results.The university has been operating a public school for more than 100 years as a training site for teaching candidates and today that effort serves 1000 students at Campus School, University Middle School, and University High School.

Toni Williams spent part of her last school board meeting as the leader of Memphis-Shelby County Schools (MSCS) looking back at everything she’s accomplished since her first meeting.Board members appointed Williams as interim superintendent in 2022 following the resignation of former superintendent Joris Ray. New superintendent Dr. Marie N. Feagins will officially take over the position on April 1.

Memphis-Shelby County Schools board members say the contract being finalized for incoming Superintendent Marie Feagins reflects the lessons learned after former Superintendent Joris Ray departed the district in scandal.For starters, the proposed contract includes a new ethical conduct clause, board members say. The board voted unanimously to approve terms of the four-year contract on Tuesday.